Thanks to a creative boy in California, thousands of folks worldwide — including those in
Columbus — will get the chance to channel their inner 9-year-old.

Saturday is the second annual Global Day of Play and will be marked by the Cardboard Challenge
on the front lawn of the Columbus Museum of Art.

The free event asks participants to use cardboard and other recyclable materials to build
something tied to a theme: this year “futuristic.”

The Day of Play is part of an international effort promoted by the Imagination Foundation, a
nonprofit organization formed in 2012 to foster creativity in children.

The foundation was sparked by Caine Monroy, a 9-year-old from Boyle Heights, Calif., who created
an elaborate cardboard arcade at his father’s auto-parts shop.

A filmmaker who stopped at the shop and saw the arcade made a short movie and posted it online
in April 2012. On the first day, the film received more than 1 million views.

That spawned the foundation, which conducted its first Global Day of Play and Cardboard
Challenge last October. More than 270 events were held in 41 countries.

One of those was at the Columbus Museum of Art, in its Center for Creativity.

The first local Cardboard Challenge was attended by about 75 people, who were asked to create
miniature-golf courses.

This year, the event has expanded and will take place outside. In the event of rain, it will
move to the Derby Court.

People of all ages may participate.

“Play is not something that just 9-year-old boys need to do,” said Cindy Foley, the museum
director of education. “It’s also something we need in our workplace, in our ongoing development as
creative people.”

To that end, a group of graduate students and recent graduates of the Knowlton School of
Architecture at Ohio State University will attend. They plan to create something, then help other
builders.

“What we consider play as children, as an adult is called experimentation,” said Richard Martz,
23, a graduate student from New Albany. “As an architect, we’re given a project, and we try to
figure out how to solve it — then make it better.

“So, really, experimentation and play is the same thing; it’s just a different term for children
and adults.”

Artist Oliver Herring of New York will conduct an activity called TASK, which invites people to
write a task for others to complete and choose one randomly out of a bucket.

The idea is to spark creative thinking — something Foley believes in.

“When we use the word
creativity, some people have an assumption that it’s something only creative types are
born with,” she said. “In reality, everyone has this. We all played as children, we all made forts,
and then we pulled away from that.

“(Cardboard Challenge) has helped me articulate that play and creativity is for everyone.”